First Class Training
by Rye J
Summary: A cleric’s rise to the highest rank of the tetra grammaton
1. Chapter 1 Father's Faith

Becoming a Cleric  
By: Ryan Hollo  
  
**This story is about a cleric, 10 years before John Preston and Dupont.  
All rights about Equilibrium(the film) belong to Dimension Films. All  
characters are the property of the author.**  
  
Chapter 1 - The Faith of Father  
  
It was like every other morning for the young cleric. Ryan rose out of bed and laid out his gray uniform. Cleric Ryan T. James was perfectly embroidered on the inner flap of his jacket. Ryan's mornings were the same every day. However his routine was not tiresome. Ryan did not feel any emotion towards the routine, it simply was what he did every single morning. He took a shower; he shaved his face, and then injected his morning prozium into his neck. On the drive in to work, he would listen to the update of the latest EC-10 contraband seizures.  
  
Upon his arrival at the grammaton training center, he receives an important notice that he was to report to the training master immediately. He reported to the training office directly after receiving the message cylinder.  
  
"Cleric Ryan, reporting as requested Sir" He said while standing at perfect military attention.  
  
The grammaton training master sat at his desk, apparently waiting for the cleric to arrive, did not even look up as the Ryan introduced himself. Behind the training master a large T window with no glass illuminated the entire room. The training master stood and began to walk towards Ryan.  
  
"Well Cleric, you have done well for yourself this past year. One of the fastest students to become a senior cleric. Your gun kata skills are nearly un-matched by any other cleric I have seen. I would like you to continue your training as I need more clerics in the first order. Recently you were upgraded to second class, and I am confident you have still yet to reach your full potential. Father has much faith in your potential. I am starting you on a new training program that will push you to your limits. From this day forth you will no longer be involved in any operations in till I deem it fit. Your fieldwork has been nothing short of perfection. However, I need clerics to be at full potential. Now you will report to training room 6 immediately to commence your new training, Your partner has been assigned to a new 3rd class cleric. Next time I see you Cleric Ryan, you will be a 1st class cleric or dead. Dismissed."  
  
Cleric Ryan bowed his head and turned to leave the room, before making his way towards training room six.  
  
When Ryan arrived at training room 6 he entered the Dojo style room, and began his usual morning calisthenics. Suddenly without a sound or warning, a quick strike to the back of Ryan's right knee brings him down on both knees and he grimaces in pain. The sheer force of the blow was enough to cause the mussels in Ryan's leg to begin to spasm, and then go numb. When Ryan looked up from his pain flinch, a standard issue cleric berretta was pointed at his left eye.  
  
"Well cleric, not as good as they told me you were. Interesting. Lets see how you handle yourself when you know there is an enemy. On your feet now!"  
  
The sensei appeared to be slight in build but powerful. It was obvious he was in great shape. He wore a white karate gee, with a belt that was black on one side and red on the other with white trim on the edges.  
  
Cleric Ryan rolled back and casually flipped back to his feet without using his hands or arms leaving himself in his standard kata defense stance.  
  
The training sensei looks at Ryan and begins to speak very slowly. "Cleric.. Ryan.. I am your.. new weapons and martial Sensei. You may call me... Sensei" As he speaks the final word, The Sensei quickly snap kicks Ryan in the chest and again Ryan is taken by surprise and falls back 3 feet almost hitting the floor again.  
  
"Your first lesson Cleric, everyone is a potential enemy, you must be ready at all times. Because I am your Sensei, does not mean I will not strike you or even try to kill you. Do you understand?"  
  
"Yes Sir" Ryan stood at stiff attention, preparing for another attack from his new sensei.  
  
"Good, now take out your guns Cleric, I want to see what all the fuss is about."  
  
Ryan removes his twin Desert Eagle Mark 10 hand guns, and empties the clips.  
  
" I did not ask you to remove the ammunition from those guns Cleric. Put the clips back in and hand me those.  
  
Ryan hands his sensei the two pistols, holding the barrel of the weapon, so his sensei could grab the handles. It was the standard way of passing a weapon to a superior.  
  
"When I first heard of your request to use weapons different from the standard issue cleric weapons, I was confused. However now with these weapons in my hands, I can see why you prefer these guns. Much more weight and higher caliber rounds are used with this weapon I see, hmmm. However it does not have an automatic setting, only the semi auto. Why do you use these weapons cleric?"  
  
"The council has approved my request to use these weapons Sensei"  
  
That was not the question Cleric, why do you use these guns?"  
  
"I use them strictly for the added range of the weapon, and I find the higher caliber rounds to be more efficient when dealing with hostiles."  
  
"And the lack of an auto setting?"  
  
"I rarely find the need for using an automatic setting, I would rather be more precise and efficient then excessively powerful. Not to mention that 44. Caliber rounds will bring down an antagonist with less ammo used. One or two rounds is all that is needed with these weapons."  
  
"Very well then, and how do you find these weapons change your Gun Kata skills?"  
  
"They do not, other then adding extra range"  
  
"Very well Cleric, we will begin the first lesson"  
  
"How would you like me to proceed Sensei?"  
  
The sensei hands the guns back to the cleric, and takes a classic defense stance. "Try to kill me Cleric"  
  
"Sir?"  
  
"You heard me, try to kill me, how would you attempt to kill me?"  
  
Ryan quickly raises both weapons to aim at the Sensei's head, but is cut short and stopped by the Blade of the Sensei's sword. "How will you shoot me if I cut off your arms cleric"  
  
"This lesson is very simple. Know your enemy. If you are going to engage an enemy with your guns, be sure that your enemy is not a capable sword fighter. Or make sure you are at an acceptable range. The blade is always faster then the gun. Remember that cleric."  
  
"Yes Sir" although Ryan knew this fact, he had not taken it into consideration when attempting his attack.  
  
"Do not rely on the gun too much Cleric, you must remember your sword."  
  
"Again" said the Sensei with a small hand expression that waved towards his chest  
  
This time the cleric quickly struck at the Sensei with his sword and the two engaged in a sword fight that ended quickly when the Sensei disarmed Ryan with a swift move that the cleric had not seen before.  
  
"That move is not in the gun kata manual, or in any of the forms I have learned" pronounced Ryan after being disarmed.  
  
"The hand book and the martial forms can only teach you so much, there are times when you must improvise, and as you become more apt and adapting your combat to each fight. You will begin to become a formidable opponent. Prepare to learn again Cleric, everything before this was only preparation"  
  
After several hours of brutal training, the sensei decided that Cleric Ryan had progressed enough to end the days lessons.  
  
Ryan had a small gash just under his right eye, and he was drenched in salty sweat. His hair was a tangled mess and he considered shaving it bald, strictly for the fact that it would be more manageable during the strenuous training schedule he knew was ahead of him. On his way to the showers, he decided he would have his head shaved.  
  
After a quick shower and shave, Ryan made his way to the Barbers office.  
  
When he came into the office, the barber was cleaning up from the previous client.  
  
"Any more time for a quick cut Jimmy?" asked Ryan  
  
The Barber looked up, and put his broom aside, "Of course Ryan, the usual?"  
  
"No, Id like a change, I want it shaved clean"  
  
The barber looked at him with a surprised and questioning glance. "Your sure about that?" he said  
  
"I'm sure Jim"  
  
Quickly without Ryan noticing the barber pressed a hidden green button under his mirror, and within 60 seconds, there were two Grammton Guards in the barber office.  
  
One of them stepped into the office while the other watched just outside the door. He pulled out a small computer pad and began asking questions.  
  
"Cleric Ryan, you have requested a change in your appearance, please answer the following questions. Do you wish to change you hair style?  
  
"Yes"  
  
"Are you unhappy, or un-satisfied with your current appearance?  
  
"No"  
  
"Does this change that you are requesting serve a purpose"  
  
"Yes"  
  
"And what is the purpose of this change?"  
  
"The training master of the first order has ordered that I continue my training to become a first class cleric. My training is rigorous and my hair has become a source of in-efficiency. I have no feelings toward either appearance, style or the hair itself, I simply want to improve my combat efficiency"  
  
"As you were cleric" The guard looked at the barber and nodded, then left the office  
  
When Jimmy came to apologize, Ryan simply lifted his hand "Its ok Jim, I understand. Just cut this hair off me"  
  
And without any more conversation, the barber did what the cleric had requested. 


	2. Chapter 2 First Test

Chapter 2 - The First Test  
  
After the hair cut Ryan made his way through the grammaton center to his car. The white Cadillac was waiting for him in his parking spot. On his drive to the residential sector, he noticed a female walking at a very erratic pace. Ryan was becoming very suspicious as he was now observing her in his rear view mirror. Suddenly the clerics watch alarm went off, and he pulled over the car in order to inject his final prozium shot of the day. He quickly snaps his injector back, and slides it into his jacket pocket. He looks back to see that the female he had observed was no longer walking but now she was running in the other direction.  
  
As his instincts set in, he turns the car around and begins a pursuit. As he comes up behind her she franticly leaps over a small fence and runs down a narrow alleyway. He calmly gets out of the car and quickly studies the layout of the alley. With ease the cleric leaps the fence and walks calmly down the ally. He knew that it would be coming to a dead end. As he approaches the end of the ally, he observes the female now crying and pounding the bottom of her fist on a large metal door on the far wall of the ally. The door was obviously locked and there was escape. When the cleric was within several feet of her, she looked at the cleric and dropped to her knees, continuing the weeping. The words were incomprehensible, but he could make out that she was begging for her life. The cleric hesitated for a moment.  
  
Ryan became slightly confused and even more curious as to why this woman was so emotional, and what the reason was for such an emotional breakdown? He realized immediately that this woman would be doomed should he have arrested her, for she was quite obviously not on prozium, and she had committed such a blatant sense offence. Offenders like this were to be terminated on sight. Crying was on of the most serious sense offences one could commit and the technicians of the palace of justice never let anyone in this situation live.  
  
With no expression on his face, Ryan reached for one of his Mark 10 pistols, switched the safety to semi and snapped back the loading bolt. He raised his arm towards the woman's head and fired one bullet into her forehead. The exit wound in the back of her skull exploded a fissure of blood and brains as an empty shell popped out of the now smoking pistol and ricocheted of the ally wall behind Ryan. The woman looked at him once more while she fell backward, into the blood sprayed wall that was painted with half of her brain and skull. The cleric switched his weapon back to safety and began to walk back to his car.  
  
Suddenly the large metal door swung open and slammed into the body of the woman who had just been slain. With a feline like reflex the cleric pulled out both of his guns, and kicked of the wall to do perfect 180-degree spin into a crouching firing position. He looked up to see his new training sensei looking at him with almost a slight smile on his face.  
  
"Cleric Ryan James. You have passed your first test. In this instance it was made to appear that this woman had no chance of surviving interrogation. You also had no supervision, partner or any apparent witnesses to the scene. You showed no mercy to this woman. You showed no compassion and no regard for her life. Well-done Cleric! This is the enemy in the disguise of a harmless female. A good cleric must always see past the appearance of an offender and consider only the face of their emotion. "  
  
"Thank you sensei, I am pleased to have met the requirements of this test. Who was the woman?"  
  
"Irrelevant. You may go home now Cleric. I will see you tomorrow morning. By the way, I noticed that you have changed your hair. It takes most clerics one week to make the change you have made in one day. In ancient times, the most well trained marshal artists all had shaved heads. Hair simply serves no good purpose in combat. Good night Cleric"  
  
"Good night" 


	3. Chapter 3 Foresight

Chapter 3 - Foresight  
  
The following morning Ryan was awaken to the soft sound of father's voice. The message was the same every morning. "Awaking to triumph in the face of yet another day..." It went on for an hour or so and he could not turn it off. It was part of the implanted media system set up in every home and business, the speakers that were installed in his wall were part of the mandatory exposure to father's message. However the monotony of the message did not affect Ryan at all.  
  
His ride to work was un-eventful. He had passed the same street where the night before he had shot a sense offender. It seemed like a now distant memory in his mind.  
  
However memory was one thing that Prozium could not eliminate. But since there was no emotional attachment to any memory, he was able to methodical assess how he had dealt with the situation. After a playback of his memory, he had decided that he dealt with the situation as best he could have. He still was somewhat curious as to what had caused that kind of emotional response in the female he had executed. The thoughts perplexed him, as he could not fathom that level of emotion. After giving this some thought, he turned up his radio to hear father's voice again. It was one of the more common speeches about Libria's survival and the evil of emotional highs and lows. And of course the usual morning's EC-10 seizures were listed and the news station covered the announcement of a new member of the vice-counsel being voted in. It was the only radio station, all other broadcast bandwidth was static.  
  
After arrival at the Monastery, Ryan began a rigorous weight training work out. He followed that with his usual morning sprint. After he had maximized his heart rate, he made his way to the dojo to meet his Sensei.  
  
Ryan walked into the Dojo and saw his sensei sitting in the center of the room. "Good morning Cleric" The sensei looked as though he was meditating with his back to the entrance of the Dojo  
  
"Good morning Sensei" the cleric responded but questioned how the man knew that it was him as he had barley entered the room when he was addressed  
  
"Come and sit, meditate with me for a moment"  
  
"Sir?"  
  
"Come Cleric, sit and relax your mind and body"  
  
Ryan knelt down parallel to his teacher, crossed his legs and sat on them imitating the same sitting position as the sensei. The old mans eyes were closed and his breathing was a steady pace of perfectly timed inhale and exhale.  
  
"Breath with me Cleric, keep the rhythm of breath tight. When you close your eyes envision the room around you. Know your surroundings without seeing."  
  
The Cleric and sensei spent the next 15 minutes in silent meditation. Suddenly Ryan was struck bluntly with a bow staff to his left shoulder. He grimaced in pain and attempted a late counter move that was un-successful. He saw his attacker dressed in a black martial arts gee. He shot a quick glace at his sensei that was holding a second bow staff with his open palms, still with his eyes closed.  
  
"I have not seen but I heard the blow that struck you cleric. I want you to meet my assistant trainers; these men are the most well trained martial artists in all of Libria. Of course I trained them myself. They will be assisting you with the remainder of your training."  
  
Both men bowed slightly and stood at attention awaiting their sensei's next orders.  
  
"This lesson is all about your perception cleric. You must be able to sense when an attack is going to strike. You must know where the attack is coming from and how you will block or counter the attack. These skills are essential to becoming a first class grammaton cleric."  
  
"But sir, I could not see the..."  
  
Ryan was cut off from finishing his sentence, by a sharp blow to the back of his head. This time we was able to counter the move, but was quickly put in a arm lock by the assistant that had struck him.  
  
"Again Cleric, what do you eyes have to do with anything? You need to sense where your antagonists are, you need to know it with out seeing it. In ancient times, this was a crucial part of learning the martial art known as Ninjitsu. This art focused on stealth and anticipation. Know where your opponent is, and if possible, make sure that they cannot detect you.' Now Cleric, shale we try this again?"  
  
The sensei handed the cleric a black cloth blindfold and asked Ryan to place it over his eyes. For the next six hours, Cleric Ryan was struck from over one hundred different angles, with more then thirty different weapons. His was a swollen mess of bruises and blood. The pain was causing small hallucinations within his mind. He began to see enemies were they were none. All of the attacks came while the cleric was blindfolded without sight. After four hours, Ryan began to feel where the attacks were going to strike, and anticipate his opponent's movement. Toward the last exercise he had felt that he might pass out from the pain coming from his shoulder blades and the pure exhaustion that had begun to set in. However, he was able to endure and complete the days training.  
  
"Very well done Cleric, you are now beginning to learn. It is time for you to retire. You need nourishment. Good night Cleric"  
  
"Good night sensei, can I expect another test tonight?"  
  
"Everything is a test Cleric, remember that" 


	4. Chapter 4 Second Test

Chapter 4 - Second Test  
  
Ryan was exhausted after the days training, he made a quick stop at the infirmary on his way to the car, and was issued some morphine in an identical glass tablet that prozium was issued in.  
  
The Doctor on staff warned the Cleric not to inject the morphine in till he was at home, as it would have affected his driving ability.  
  
The Clerics drive home was painful, and longer then usual.  
  
At home, he quickly injected his morphine and immediately felt much better. He could feel all of his muscles relax and his body felt a numbness that was a perfect ending to a days training. He went straight to bed and was able to fall asleep easily. The last thought in his mind was of his sensei and the training he was enduring. "Will I become a first class Cleric?"  
  
Ryan was then sound asleep.  
  
That night Ryan was awaken suddenly to the sound of his front door slamming shut. He arose quickly but stumbled as he went to reach for his weapons. NOTHING. His guns and sword were gone. Had he put them down in the right place before sleeping, he could not remember. He then attempted to turn on the lights, but when he flipped the light switch nothing happened. As he adjusted his eyes to the luminance in his apartment he was swiftly taken of his feet.  
  
"Get up Cleric"  
  
"Who is there?" asked Ryan, with no response. The voice was not familiar to him at all.  
  
Again Ryan was struck but this time he did not even feel where the blow had come from or landed. The morphine must still be working. He took a defensive fight stance and attempted to sense where his opponent was. Again he felt the powerful force of a quick blow to the back of his ribs. He felt no pain and even the sensation seemed late. Abruptly Ryan attempted a move that covered most of his parameter but he felt no contact with anything more then his bedpost. Again he was struck, but he could not sense the attack itself let alone the attacker. He was hit a number of times before he yelled out in frustration.  
  
"Well Cleric, it seems you have failed this lesson" It was his sensei speaking now, that voice was unmistakable.  
  
"No Sensei, I still may be able to ."  
  
With one final strike the assailant that had intruded Ryan's home brought down the Cleric with a very simple move that had been taught to Ryan when he began his martial training over 16 years ago.  
  
Ryan fell to his knees and dropped his head in disappointment.  
  
The lights then came on. Ryan looked around to see that his sensei and assistant sensei were both standing in the room.  
  
"Well young Cleric, not only have you failed this test, but you dishonor yourself with this look of sorrow. A warrior has no time for sorrow. Cleric, I expect to see you in one hour at the Dojo. We will continue this lesson. The next time I see you I want to know why you failed this lesson tonight."  
  
Without waiting for a response the sensei and assistant left the cleric's apartment the cleric's apartment 


End file.
